So Comes a Golden Age
by SubNordicStudio
Summary: My take on how Dunwall is after the events of the game. I killed nobody but Havelock. Corvo is even more troubled than before and Emily is about to take the crown. Sorry for the short length of the chapters, but I want some input. Some credit goes to Chatty1113, who wrote: So Ends the Interregnum.
1. Chapter 1

So Comes a Golden Age

"_It's a funny thing, ambition. It can take one to sublime heights or harrowing depths. And sometimes, they are one and the same. Roseburrow learned that lesson all too well."_

_Empress Emily Kaldwin, I _

The darkness still creeps through the windows of Dunwall Tower. I am still awake, particularly nervous about tomorrow. Emily Kaldwin will finally be crowned Empress, two months after I had rescued her from the lighthouse. I shifted back and forth under the covers, trying to get comfortable. A knock on the door startled me from movement. I slide out, glad for an excuse to be up. I saw the faded mark of the Outsider still on my hand, reminding me of the last acknowledgment from the Void.

**So ends the interregnum, and now Emily Kaldwin the First, will take her mother's throne, after a season of turmoil. You will stand at her side, Corvo, guiding her young mind, and protecting her from those who seek to exploit her, or cause her harm. You watched and listened when other me would have shouted in rage. You held back instead of striking. So it is, with the passing of the plague and Emily's ascension, comes a golden age, brought about by your hand. And decades hence, when your hair turns white and you pass from this world, Empress Emily – Emily the Wise, at the height of her power – will lay your body down within her mother's great tomb, because you were more to her than Royal Protector. Farewell, Corvo.**

The Outsiders mark on my hand faintly pulses, reminding me I am still watched. I tiredly stride to the door and open it. I yawn and see that young Emily is there, looking up at me, fatigued and worried, slightly. "Emily, whats wrong?" I ask, inviting her into my room.

"Nothing, it's nothing. I'm just nervous is all,"

I smile warmly, "That's completely understandable. You're about to become Empress, after all," I sigh, "Jessamine would be so proud," more to myself than Emily.

"How do you do it? Cope with nervousness? Considering what you've been through recently," Emily looks at me.

"Quite simply, I don't," I tell her, "I just learn to ignore my nerves, or calm them somehow. Sleep always helps," I add, slyly.

Emily sighs under a smile, "I wish I was more like you, Corvo,"

A slight fizzle in the distance, my windows are open, I realize.

I hug Emily and ask her if she needs anything. She wants to sleep in my room tonight. "Be my guest, Emily. Sleep will definitely help. I'll get some more pillows," I exit the room and get a servant to give me three extra pillows. I enter my room again and see that Emily is laying on my large bed. Dropping the pillows where I see fit, I climb in and kiss Emily goodnight.


	2. Chapter 2

~ Chapter 2 – Piero and The Protector ~

I awoke again, stirring to the sound of a tap on the door frame and a piece of paper sliding under it. _Goddammit _I thought sliding out of bed, careful not to wake Emily. The wristclock (an invention of Piero's and Sokolov's) on my right arm said it was about four o'clock in the morning. I shambled (not unlike a weeper) to the door and bent down to inspect the note.

_Corvo,_

_It is of utmost importance that I speak to you immediately_

_I shall explain when I see you._

_Piero Joplin_

The note was slightly cryptic itself, but against my better judgment, I attached my sword over my night-clothes and slid into some black shoes. I carefully opened the door, as to not disturb anyone's slumber. I crept, considering over the past few months that was all I'd been doing, to Piero's lab. His alliance with me and Emily, while Havelock, Martin, and Pendleton betrayed us, gave him a position as Royal Philosopher, and he shared it with Sokolov.

That meant that he'd been given a lab in Dunwall Tower that he shared with Sokolov as well. The good thing was that Sokolov and Piero were friends. I nodded at a guard standing outside the lab. He looked confused at why I was awake at this hour of morning. He didn't ask. I knocked on the door, "Joplin, there better be a fucking good reason that I'm awake at," I had to recheck the wristclock, "four fifteen, in the goddamn morning,"

There was a clanking sound as something obviously fell. I heard Piero exclaim, "Shit! I'll have to fix that later or Sokolov will have my ass," The door opened, revealing a disgruntled Piero. He looked exhausted, bags under his eyes and everything.

"Alright, why did you wake me up at four?"

Piero dragged me in and pulled me to an upstairs window. "It may be paranoid dilutions, but that light," He indicated to a streetlamp, illuminating the courtyard below, "is flickering out. I think we may have a problem!"

I looked at him and laughed, "Piero, what medicinal herbs have you been putting in your pipe? What kind of a problem is that? I'll get a guard to replace the bulb." I started to leave the lab.

"But..." Piero wimpered.

"Goodnight, Piero!" I turned to face him, "Get some sleep, Emily's coronation isn't until three o'clock, anyway," I walked out of the lab and told the guard next to the door to replace the lamp in the courtyard. I teased Piero for being a bit dramatic and walked back to my room.

I slid back into my room, quietly, and crawled back into place in bed. I heard Emily whisper to me.

"Where were you, dad?"

"Piero was worried about a lamp, can you believe that?" I hugged her again and told her to get to sleep. I again drifted off to sleep and dreamed of Jessamine and I raising Emily.

Little did most people know, I was married to Jessamine, and we raised Emily together. We were married privately for thirteen years and then she was killed, while I took the blame. I wish Emily hadn't had to see that, her mother getting killed. Almost as much as I wished she hadn't seen me kill Havelock. The difference was that he was about to kill her, too. Emily had seen so much beyond her years. Jessamine did, too. She had been almost shot, execution style, by an assassin. I wish she didn't have to watch me kill that man, too.

I sometimes thought myself a monster. I didn't like killing others. I almost always avoided it, like when I was to kill Hiram, I didn't. Instead, I exposed his secrets. His fate is to be decided by Emily, tomorrow at her coronation. I only killed to protect the ones I love. I killed most of Daud's assassins, that fateful day, I killed the unknown assassin, ready to shoot the Empress, and I killed Havelock, not just for Emily, though. I did it with a certain kind of selfishness, vengeance is what they call it, in the books they read.

Most people believed that Farley needed to die, I just wanted him to die.

I woke up just as dawn peered through the glass windows.\


End file.
